King Louis XVI's Champagne

By Sarah TungMonday, Aug. 02, 2010

Robert Jansson / AP

When Swedish divers found an 18th century shipwreck at the bottom of the Baltic Sea in July, they uncovered 30 bottles of 230-year-old bubbly. Wine connoisseur Ella Gruessner Cromwell-Morgan sampled the find, which she described as sweet, fizzy and "fabulous." The golden ambrosia's bouquet had strong notes of tobacco, as well as "grapes and white fruits, oak and mead." It's likely these bottles could be antique Veuve Clicquot, a premium brand of French champagne and part of a consignment sent by King Louis XVI to the Russian imperial court. If confirmed, the bottles would be not only the oldest drinkable champagne in the world but among the priciest as well. Cromwell-Morgan estimates each bottle could fetch anywhere from $69,000 to more than $100,000. Fabulous indeed.